EA Says Origin To Become Social Network, Has 5 million Daily Users

In a recent interview, COO of Electronic Arts, Peter Moore, talked a little bit about Origin and basically made it sound a lot scarier than what it’s supposed to be. Saying that people who adopt to it first will be the last to understand what EA is trying to achieve with it and that the service has already achieved 5 million daily users in just four months. There's also plans to further improve and extend the service into a full fledged social network.

We're only four and a half months in and already over five million people are using it on a daily basis…I think in its broadest sense they think it is just EA's answer to Steam, and it is much more than that. Like any great content provider, you want to provide yourself with a platform to talk directly with your customers... That's exactly what Origin is all about.

There that line is again…”talk directly with your customers”…we’ve been hearing, seeing and reading about this line ever since Battlefield 3 was pulled from Steam. For the most part the idea sounds frightening for a consumer because of the clause in the EULA for Origin that says EA can close out your account if it’s inactive for more than two years. Prompting users to do one of two things: continue using the service to ensure that your entitlements, DLC and games don’t get locked out, or reactive the account if it does get closed by paying a small service fee.

Moore went on to say that…

"The console first parties understand what we are doing. I think the fans, the people that have to use it in the early going, are the ones that get it last in regards to what we are trying to do."

The early adopters are the ones who don’t see EA as being sneaky, conniving corporate wallet-rapers…so I suppose, if you look it at from that perspective no they wouldn’t understand what EA is trying to do with Origin. People cautious about jumping aboard the Origin train would probably want to hold out as long as possible until you get the full gist of what EA is trying to do.

Take note also that the five million users Moore states is using Origin on a daily basis are people transferred over from previous EA digital services. Remember, EA has conslidated all their account services into one place. So if you were registered with EA Link, the EA Downloader, you have an EA Sports account, or you’re signed up with any other EA service such as their Play4Free service then you’re automatically tied into Origin. Technically, Peter Moore isn’t lying about the five million users because in regards to collectively counting users from the aforementioned services, it would be true. Moore also stated that Origin will become a social network as it continues to evolve.